Bellwood, IL Beauty and Salons

Dr. Michelle Beth Hicks and her licensed staff at Avanti Skin Center brighten and smooth skin with an array of services including facials, laser treatments, and injections. Staff members consult with clients and offer free estimates before embarking on the noninvasive treatment that best suits individual needs. Botox injections relax wrinkle-causing muscles, or facial fillers such as Juvederm and Restylane fill in creases to make skin as smooth as a freshly Zambonied peanut-butter skating rink. Specialists also treat skin to UV-free spray tans and microdermabrasion treatments that exfoliate away discoloration, scarring, and s’mores remnants.

During more than 20 years as a nail artist, Maureen Donlan has encountered dozens of women. She noticed how busy many of her clients were and how difficult it was for them to fit in a simple manicure during a hectic day. When she discovered permanent makeup, she knew it was the answer to many of these women's troubles—something that could let them get through an entire day without once checking their lipstick in the mirror. Maureen became certified in permanent makeup in 2004 and never looked back.

At Amazing Faces, Maureen offers today's women an alternative to traditional cosmetics. With safe and meticulous techniques, she adds permanent flair to lips, eyes, and eyebrows and performs corrective work and scar camouflaging to conceal evidence of past accidents or surgeries. She also boosts blinks with eyelash tinting and extensions to provide defense from lecherous butterflies. In addition, Maureen calls upon her past to shape and groom nails before coating them in standard or gel polishes.

CiCi Nails has all the trappings of a traditional salon—pedicure chairs line one wall and manicure tables line the other—but the artistic inclinations of its creative nail technicians set the shop apart. During manicure and pedicure services, technicians festoon freshly groomed nails with adornments including vibrant colors, patterned tips, jewels, or specks of glitter. Techs compose each miniature masterpiece out of professional-grade pigments, including UV gel polishes, Zoya’s toxin-free polishes, and Calgel’s no-chip polishes that can cling to nail fibers for up to three weeks.

Sonia Salon’s aestheticians draw on Ayurvedic medicine and traditional Indian health and beauty treatments as they pamper clients with contemporary facials, massages, and waxes. Ayurvedic treatments draw on 5,000 years of herbal healing tradition as they aim to balance the body’s internal energies and enhance beauty, and henna tattoos ornament skin on special occasions such as weddings or driving-school graduation ceremonies. Waxing and threading services rid clients of unsightly strands and leave eyebrows fit to hang in an expression of incredulity for hours, facial treatments keep mugs radiant, and massages melt stress with up to 10 modalities.

Luminere Esthetics and Wellness is open-minded when it comes to beauty and wellness treatments. The spa's treatment menu contains both Western and Eastern techniques, ranging from waxing and microdermabrasion to Reiki and chakra balancing. But as a partner of Spa Technologies, Luminere is much pickier about the spa products it employs. All of the products it uses are all-natural, made from essential oils and botanicals. The key ingredient, seaweed, provides rejuvenating minerals during custom facials and other skin and body care treatments. Luminere also avoids using products that have been tested on animals or formed from congealed air pollution.

The staff at Smiling Bright believes that there’s one accessory that looks good on everyone: a gleaming, white smile. Luckily, that happens to be the office's specialty. During procedures, trained technicians help clients swathe their smiles with dental trays full of peroxide-based whitening gel, which is then activated by an LED light. Though the solution contains at least 10 percent peroxide, it stays gentle thanks to a vitamin E coating that shields the lips and gums. Stains disappear from the tooth enamel in 20- to 60-minute sessions erasing all evidence of coffee drinking, wine sipping, and newsprint gnawing. Smiling Bright’s retail store also sells professional-quality X Cell Erator systems that can brighten teeth several shades at home.